In response to the Supreme Court’s opinion in Relentless v. Commerce, Evergreen Action Vice President Craig Segall released the following statement:
“With today’s ruling, the court’s MAGA majority has opened the door for Big Oil and every other malevolent corporate actor to abuse our justice system and attempt to undo decades of regulations. The dismantling of the Chevron doctrine grants every Trump-appointed judge the authority to overrule agency experts’ interpretation of the law and substitute their ideological viewpoint for the informed determination of career public servants.
“This decision is a major setback for everyone who believes we deserve a safe, livable future, and a victory for greedy corporations that want to skirt vital safety and public health protections for the sake of their bottom line. But the fight isn’t over. Evergreen is committed to reviewing the policy landscape previously upheld by Chevron deference, including the fossil fuel industry’s favorite loopholes, and demanding the plain text of our bedrock environmental laws be wielded in service of ambition, not retreat.
“And it’s no surprise that the Court issued this decision the same term that its right-wing members voted to attack basic clean air protections from power plants—yet again. This Court is ready to attack public health to serve its corporate masters. This gift from the MAGA majority to corporate interests is yet another reminder of why we must act urgently to update the shockingly ineffective ethics standards for justices and expand the court. As the current majority gets ever more emboldened to claim authority over the other branches of government, we risk not only a constitutional crisis, but the future of our planet and our democracy.”
Earlier this month, Evergreen released What Is the Chevron Doctrine? The Big Climate Case You Might Not Know About, breaking down how the Chevron doctrine has shaped the last 40 years of federal policymaking and the fossil fuel-funded effort to dismantle the doctrine and hand MAGA judges the power to undo decades of commonsense policymaking and shield corporations from common sense regulations. Read the full explainer here.